


A Castle With No King

by Ysmiyr



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Aftermath of Torture, Angst, Bisexual John Watson, Burn S4, But no one is happy at first, Drugs, Episode Fix-It: s02e03 The Reichenbach Fall, Gay Sherlock Holmes, Happy Ending maybe, Implied/Referenced Torture, It's all a clusterfuck and a mess, M/M, Miscommunication, Not S4 compilant, Not a Deathfic, Possible triggering events - Be warned, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Ugly scarring
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-03-08
Updated: 2019-03-07
Packaged: 2019-11-13 16:15:58
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,251
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18034928
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ysmiyr/pseuds/Ysmiyr
Summary: When working, Sherlocks feels like King of his own castle.Any other time, he feels more like ghosts of previous heirs, drifting along for a ride he didn't remember getting a ticket to, and not really caring where it led.The only constant was, he was an only ghost. There was never other with him.Until there was.But he kept going, and didn't notice. But this one wouldn't be left behind.This is how Sherlock learns to be King whenever he wants. This is how he learns his crown is big enough for two.





	A Castle With No King

**Author's Note:**

> Hey guys, so; after a lifetime lurking in the Sherlock fandom I decided to start doing stuff too, starting with one of the scenes that always bothered me. I may be trying to write one fic in every known trope in the fandom, just to get myself back into pratice. So yeah, this is a TRF Remake, canon only up until there, and to be honest I've no clue where it will lead. Hope you enjoy anyway!  
> Pov changes between John and Sherlock, but mainly this is in the point of view of John.  
> Major warnings for possible triggers in this fic, too!!! Torture, abuse, PTSD and all that jazz, please be warned! Tags will be added as I progress, so keep an eye on them.  
> NOT a deathfic.

Two years, ten months and seventeen days.

 The cursor kept blinking, his fingers raised above the keyboard, his eyes still not really seeing anything.

 Outside, the wind was harsh enough to make the windows rattle, howling viciously with the drops of rain that punched the glass. The faucet in the kitchen was dripping, the noise seeming to grow louder and louder until it was the only sound inside the apartment.

 The four piles of boxes and a backpack were sitting by the door, dust from two weeks accumulating on top casting ominous shadows near his feet, and the light that did enter trough the curtains made tiny speckles in the air shine.

 Regardless of the raging storm outside, the flat was still, silent and unmoved. Unchanged. A fixed point in time, with Sherlock's computer still open on the corner of the living room table, a piece of dark blue fabric thrown to the back of his chair, the union jack battered throw pillow at it's feet.

 John himself felt still trapped into the cycle that followed those days immediately after _it_ , staring at the black chair across his own, at the knife stabbed to the fireplace, at the petri dishes and beakers in the kitchen table, at the semi closed door at the end of the hallway. Nicotine patches fell from their box, near the coat hanger, and there they stayed. John couldn't take a deep breath for the smell of chemicals, impregnated cigarette smoke and the black tea atop the microwave made his head swim, and his stomach churn, the smells making tears fall more efficiently than the smiley yellow face on the damask wallpaper staring at him, covering bullet holes made in simpler times.

 With a twitch in his fingers, John shut his computer with a soft click and limped to the boxes. There were two others upstairs, filled with newspapers clippings, small notebooks, restaurant receipts, show tickets, some photographs, a pair of gloves, a chinese cat. A dark coat and a case of small metal tools. John couldn't handle to even look at those.

 He was trying, he really was, but he couldn't leave Baker Street. He couldn't leave behind all that it meant. Leaving would mean actually trying to close that book, but John just wasn't ready to forget. Lestrade tried to help. Mike, Mary and Molly too. But they weren't enough.

 No one would ever be enough.

 He never felt like this before, so utterly and completely alone in his grief and sorrow, the loneliness crushing and suffocating, not knowing if he was going to die before the day was over and the last sight he was ever going to have wasn't the only one he so desperately needed. Not even in the weeks after coming back from Afghanistan were this bad. Because then he didn't know how it was to have someone that fit with you as well as he did now. Because he never felt a more complete kind of happiness than when he was face to face with a head in the fridge, and had to sleep at a hotel to avoid getting poisoned by some exotic plant Sherlock decided to set fire to.

 The boxes mocked him.

 This ritual was a daily occurrence now. John would sit with his laptop, trying to write something, anything to give the pressure inside him a way out that didn't involve pressing the barrel of a gun against his temple, to only be able to change the numbers on the date, stare at his feet and the chair, at the scarf and the well used carpet, limp to the pile of boxes and feel judged by them. The surgery was a sort of pause button to all the mess inside him, but not by much. Mrs. Hudson came by every two days, always with a plate of something, lines carved deep in her forehead and tense shoulders that spoke too loud for the quiet place John wanted to drown in.

 He sometimes went for walks, when the weather was cold, and left his coat at the flat for the cold he could still understand, in the stiffness of his injured shoulder, and the ache in his knees. The cold outside seemed to dim the cold inside of him, and while getting back into somewhere warm was rather like a drug high ending, the crash ugly and angry and unpredictable, it was better than ending up in a cell overnight in a small police station because he needed to punch something and that guy was looking at him for far too long.

 John didn't liked to consider himself a quitter, and for the first few months, after the grief was so constant he forgot how it was to not feel it, in the moments fueled by alcohol and despair, he thought about ways that he could get Sherlock back. A big grandiose murder, a gruesome string of assassinations, something intricate and mad enough to make Sherlock come back from the grave. But John was also a grounded man, most of the time, and with sobriety came the knowledge that he wouldn't be capable of thinking of something big enough to awe the ghost back into it's shell. And so he thought about suicide as well, the next best thing being joining his best friend, but he was also not a coward, for more that sometimes he really wishes he _were_ , and then he was stuck in this half exiting condition, unable to do anything but weep, and sometimes just stay there, looking on as life passed him by.

 

 ---

 

Every step was painful, and every breath made him certain that his lungs had been replaced by some kind of giant morning star. It was only mildly cold in the street, and the smell and feel of the London air was a blessing Sherlock was not likely to forget ever again. Underneath the coat, he still had on a semi ripped orange shirt and a pair of worn and dirty sweatpants. His feet dragged against the pavement, tripped when he reached the steps for the black door and stopped. The relief that consumed him as he slowly entered the corridor was almost oppressing in it's intensity and Sherlock felt the sudden urge to lay down right there and kiss the wood flooring.

 His back was chafed from the coat and his legs were sore, but even so, he did not had a row with his brother to be back home before seeing a doctor to sleep on the floor. So with a grimace he gripped the handrail hard enough for his fingers to loose what little color they had, and began climbing the stairs, his progress slow, tortuous and loud.

 His mind went blank save for the motion of putting one foot in front of the other, coordinating his arms to not let him fall backwards, so it was a surprise as much as it was terrifying to find himself barely inside the flat with a gun pointed to his head.

 His first thought was that there was someone he missed; someone else determined to finish what was started years ago. Then he took a deep breath to try and make his limbs cooperate once more, and all his body locked into place. He couldn't really see in the little light the kitchen gave off, but he didn't need to. He would recognize that smell anywhere, mentally impaired or not.

 -John?-his voice didn't sound like his own, like he couldn't feel his vocal cords moving and it hurt to speak. The figure took a small step back, but the hand pointing the gun didn't move.

 -Who the. Hell are you?- His voice was clipped, strained, and Sherlock remembered with startling clarity of that day in the cemetery, and how words seemed to come with such difficulty to a man that was a part-time writer.

 -What?

 -He died. I saw it. I saw the body. Who. ARE. You?-and he sounded like he could cry, like he could scream, and like he had the strength to do neither.

 -I'm here, John.- Sherlock couldn't think. It felt as if his brain was splattered to the ground of a dirty cell somewhere in the desert, for he wasn't expecting the doctor to still be there despite that being the sole reason why he never gave up. His morphine addled brain couldn't really process what he was seeing, and he felt like he was chained again, dangling between having his skin torn from his muscles and hurtful unconsciousness. -I left but I came back.

 A rustle of fabric was all the warning he got before the ceiling lights were turned on and his eyes screamed. Sherlock stumbled back a bit, seeking support on the door, and tried his best to hold on and not fall to his knees.

 -I am hallucinating again.- John said, voice faint.- You were dead. I _saw_ _your body_.

 Tears filling his eyes as he forced them open, Sherlock murmured- For a while. I'm not anymore though.-And then a laugh so broken left John's lips that Sherlock thought he would prefer to be alone freezing in Siberia again.

 -The great Sherlock Holmes. Defying death. Satisfied are you?- He threw the gun into the sofa, raking his now shaking hands through his hair.-Is this grandiose enough for you? Ridiculous enough?

 His whisper-scream voice was worse than if he was shouting and Sherlock wanted to reach out and trow that sorrow looking at him right out of the window. - I didn't had a choice; I-

 -YOU. You didn't had any other choice? That's rich. That's just rich.- John now was smiling and the emotional rollercoaster he was in left Sherlock even more exhausted.- What else. You are going to tell me you didn't know how long you would be in vacation?

 -I didn't knew even if I was-

 -SHUT UP.- Sherlock closed his mouth with a snap, his teeth so sore that more tears gathered in the corner of his eyes.- Two years. And you. You just...- Suddenly John was walking up to his face, his anger making him tremble, and his shoulders got in line and Sherlock had a millisecond between his muddled mind making the connection and the fist reaching his face. His head slammed against the door frame, and his knees gave up on holding him up. The fragile stitches near his ear split open again and the flat was running laps around him but Sherlock supposed that was about right. A punch was the very least he could endure to help John accept this, since he didn't even made an effort to make a more entertaining reappearance.

 -I never meant to take so long.- He said with a wavering voice, and looked up to the other man, that looked between his fist and his face, pale and nauseated.

 -Oh my God.- That would be the blood, probably. Or not; it was hard to tell when he couldn't focus all that well on the ashen face above him.- _Oh my God_.- John whispered before turning left, down the stairs and out the front door, running like the apartment caught on fire. Sherlock took a moment to try and process exactly what had just transpired but the pain made it impossible to concentrate enough.

 Some part of him, the part no narcotics could silence was banging pots and pans, screaming itself hoarse to not let John go, to do anything other than lie limp as a dishcloth on the doorway, but it was so, so difficult to move. His body felt like it was made of gelatin and stone and mashed potatoes and he couldn't really feel his feet anymore, but the ground wasn't that bad. It was preferable to standing up and searching the bathroom for clean gauze and some other kind of pain reliever, and all the damage was done already anyway. But that part of him was making a ruckus, enough so that he couldn't truly pass out, but neither was he entirely conscious.

 Sherlock lay there for what felt like enough time for it to be clear outside already, but the flat was still only illuminated by artificial lightning when he heard pounding on the stairs. He didn't remembered hearing the front door open, so he waited for a moment to see Mrs Hudson appear. But as the noise stopped, and he didn't heard her scream, he began to consider that maybe she wasn't even there anymore. The thought made a bone deep sadness wash over him.

 It was silent for a while, and Sherlock begun to enter a new kind of torpor when he felt the light pressure on his shoulder. Opening his eyes just a fraction made his body start trembling anew, or just made him aware of it again, and he looked at the sight without blinking.

 -Why are you still on the floor?- John asked, eyes glued to the streak of red on his face. Sherlock took a moment longer to be able to open his mouth and God since when his tongue felt so useless?

 -Can't.- That was about all he managed, and tried to complete the sentence with his swollen eyes. John looked even more distressed at this news, staring at the almost delicate hands lying limp against the wood floor with glassy eyes and a locked jaw.

 A moment later John seemed to come to an agreement with himself and looked at Sherlock with a steady gaze.

 -Why can't you get up?

 -Hut- Sherlock had the distinct impression John might actually cry, and if he had the coordination he would text Mycroft asking to be thrown back to the snakes, because even after all of this he still could only hurt John Watson.

 -If I helped, could you get to the couch?- John was already standing, maneuvering his body to take his weight, voice soft.

 -Dunno.- Sherlock watched, feeling rather disconnected from the body being moved, as John hauled him up in his arms, and with five long steps- didn't it used to be three?- put Sherlock into the dark couch.

 Only then John took notice of the clothes Sherlock was wearing and a sigh that sounded a lot like a sob escaped his lips. The fact that Sherlock wasn't being caustic and wasn't even speaking properly seemed to trow John off a lot, and he opened his mouth a few times before managing:

 -What happened, Sherlock? Why are you...- John stopped, eyes flickering between the blood on his face to the tattered shirt, and left without another word, shaking his head. Sherlock didn't had sufficient time to registrate and worry about his absence, for John was back holding a few towels and the first aid kit in less than half a minute.

 The familiarity of the situation made Sherlock's shoulders drop, and his mind went quiet for a moment. His head lolled in the backrest of the sofa, a bright yellow blur on the wallpaper making him almost smile.

 

\---

 

After Sherlock passing out, John stood there for a moment longer, his limbs deciding weather or not they wanted to help. The sight wasn't that bad, but then again not much was as bad as seeing bits of a person blown up above a car. His eyes kept returning to the bright red painted across the gaunt face, and he couldn't help but notice that his hands weren't this shaky for a long time. The weight of the medical kit was not comforting in the least and the towels abruptly felt much rougher than they were last night. Even his own worn jeans were making him uncomfortable.

 Sherlock was breathing shallowly, body still tense. The shirt had dark spots on it, some brown and some burgundy, some holes too, and the pants weren't much better. The grey overcoat was bulky and alien and made Sherlock look small and frail. John felt his gut twisting and wanted to run away again, but he couldn't. He was not capable of leaving Sherlock like this. It felt very much like a dream, but John still was not able to shake the desperate need to mend, to fix. To take away the pain that was staring at him since he turned on the lights.

 Maybe, if he fixed this one thing, he could have his life back. Just this once he might-

 -No use for that now- he muttered moving his gaze to his legs, trying to make them move by themselves. No such luck, but his phone vibrated on his pocket. In the silence of the sitting room, it echoed and bounced on the walls, and it just felt so wrong to have anything on the world that still functioned, to have anything remembering him that the outside was real, that no one else was frozen on the spot.

 With unsteady fingers, John reached for the mobile, the weight of it strange somehow. On the screen, a text message was waiting. Mary's number stared at him with judging brightness. John trew the phone behind him, almost hoping it would break and leave him alone.

 Moving around the coffee table and putting down the towels, John found he couldn't look for too long at the dirty face in front of him. The stark contrast was a distant call of that day on the morgue, and everything about Sherlock was out of place. The dark circles under his eyes were never there before, his beautiful raven hair was replaced by an offending shade of red, so long it almost brushed his shoulders and the stubble reaching his neck had an unkempt look to it. If he hadn't seen those eyes open and searching, John wouldn't believe this was the same person.

 Opening and closing his hands a few times, trying to focus on his breathing and falling back into his mechanical procedure, John concluded the priority was to get rid of the blood.

 With cotton balls and dabs so light it didn't even seemed to make a difference, John cleaned, stitched, and bandaged the sloppy gash on the left of Sherlock's head. And then it was a familiar routine, bordering on comforting; Clean, close, bandage, repeat. John did it with all the cuts he could see, and then put out a glass of water and some of the last painkillers on the table. Sitting at the other end of the couch, John watched and waited, his cold body and utter calm betraying his shock.

 

\---

 

The first thing he noticed was the honking cars.

 And then a low groan when he tried to open his eyes to find the morning sun mocking him.

 A beat passed, and the light behind his eyelids disappeared. Sherlock dared to try again only to be startled into silence as he looked to the black and white wallpaper above his head. A crooked smiley face overlooked the room, and his back rested against a familiar indent on the couch.

 Slowly, Sherlock lifted his head. The hazy sitting room of 221B welcomed him.

 Everything seemed the same from when he left, so long ago. The closed curtains were still the same ghastly beige color, his computer still on the same corner of the table, the same books on the side table near the door. The light of the kitchen was lit, and the pattern it cast on the red and blue rug where it touched daylight made him tremble with homesickness. People screamed outside of the tall windows, distant sirens passed by in regular intervals, the bell on the cafe downstairs rattled constantly, confirming to him what time it should be. These always were his favorite kind of dreams; The ones he could retreat to the blissful kind of unconsciousness, and have a few moments of respite.

 -Awake now, are you?- to his left, standing near the small bookcase, John looked at him with a hand to the wall. Sherlock had to blink a few times, startled. The John that appeared in his dreams was always smiling. This John however, seemed that smiles were something he couldn't even define. He was also thinner and more tired-looking, the frown his forehead hid present in the corners of his mouth.

 -John?- And even his voice was wrong, crawling its way out of his throat painfully and coming out broken and uneven. Sherlock scowled at his inability to not destroy even his only moments of peace, trying to move out of the couch and the stiff position only to find that.... he couldn't. His limbs didn't seem to want to cooperate, his reflexes sluggish. Now worried of this being some kind of elaborate torture device, Sherlock eyed “John” with narrowed eyes.

 -Do you know where you are?-The doctor asked, sounding like he knew what the other was thinking. -Or even what it's today's date?

 -I'm at Baker Street but...- turning his head to look for the indents near the bottom of the door frame that could give him a semblance of sureness, Sherlock found himself unable to focus on them long enough. A headache he wasn't aware of before suddenly pressed insistently against his eyes, and his ribs hurt from breathing too deeply.

 -You arrived yesterday... Today, around two in the morning. We are in London, in your old flat.- John's voice was monotone but patient. Sherlock turned back to him slowly, and squinted his eyes at the figure. - You have been sleeping for about six hours.

 -Oh.- Not a dream, apparently. Dream John was usually much more affectionate than that. Dream Sherlock was also never in pain, and never had sudden bursts of amnesia.

 Then something vibrated next to the fireplace, and Sherlock had to close his eyes tightly against the influx of memories coming back; his fight with Mycroft on the plane, the one at the car, the morphine injections. Walking home with a pain in his feet that was almost welcoming when he neared the apartment. John.

 -Oh. I...- His voice was useless still, too wavering to be able to continue a conversation, and Sherlock didn't know what to do. John looked impassive, but there was anger behind his eyes. A deep seated anger, sprinkled with something akin to regret.

 -Painkillers on the table.- was all he said, and Sherlock saw them next to a full glass of water he wasn't sure he could lift.

 -Did I...- John moved briskly, putting the glass in Sherlock's hand, holding the pills in his open palm, seemingly to shut him up. Sherlock drank the water, only managing half of it, but pushed the medicine away. He shook his head minutely, sitting up gritting his teeth, hearing his back crack a few times.

 -Your ribs are broken.- John said in protest, trying to give him the white circles.

 - I can't think. The morphine did... clouded my head.- He stopped talking. Looking into the dark blue eyes above him, Sherlock never felt so small.

 -You need it.

 -Not now. Mycroft will... - As if on cue, the front door opened softly, and three sets of steps could be heard. John tensed, eyeing the gun near Sherlock. A silly reaction; as if a criminal would get in by the main door, but slightly reassuring all the same.

 Mycroft came into view first, two women carrying leather bags behind him.

 -Good to see you already awake. How was the night?- his eyes flickered to John for a second and Sherlock really wanted to hit him for not even alluding to this other problem.

 -Oh no.- John whispered, incredulous.- You were in on this, weren't you. That's why you didn't even went to the funeral.-Sherlock closed his eyes as the situation only got worse.

 -No time for pleasantries now, Doctor. Sherlock needs a hospital, and since he refused last night, I imagine has had enough pain for now, isn't that right, brother dear?

 -Twas enough two years ago.- Sherlock murmured, but John heard him all the same. The blond had an open mouthed expression of disbelief and anger as if he didn't know in what to believe. Mycroft seemed unperturbed.

 John looked on from his spot, eyes wide. The expression on his thin face made him look years younger, but the wrinkles and the desperation in his eyes told of centuries endured.

 -Who else knew?- John asked, low and unsteady. Mycroft stared at his brother and Sherlock tried to take a deeper breath.

 -Molly.

 -WHAT.- His voice wasn't loud, but the stillness from the flat made it echo.-You mean to tell me that MOLLY HOOPER knew about this, but you didn't think I needed to know too?

 -This is hardly time-

 -Fuck you, Mycroft Holmes. This smells like it had your finger in it, and I can't imagine Sherlock would have accepted it. But then again- John locked eyes with the limp detective- It seems my imagination isn't that great.

 -She didn't matter- Sherlock rasped, urging him to understand- They were all looking at-

 -Enough.- Mycroft did seem annoyed now, and he motioned for the two women move forward.- There will be time for idle chit-chat later. He needs a hospital, _Doctor_ , surely you understand.

Sherlock felt like a puppet hanging by strings, hollow, numb and deaf as he watched his brother and John fight. It was too much effort to keep his head up. It was too much effort to even try to breathe. He couldn't feel his feet. For just a moment, Sherlock closed his eyes.

He didn't open them again.

**Author's Note:**

> Also, enligsh is not my mother language, so if i let any mistakes pass, please let me know!  
> Come say hi on Tumblr! [ X ](http://therudeidiotof221b.tumblr.com/)


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